Nielsen: Blame dad for death

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen called the death of a girl, 7, in Border Patrol custody a “sad example of the dangers” migrants face and blamed her family for the tragedy.

Nielsen, contradicting her own agency Friday on “Fox & Friends,” said border agents offered “immediate care,” but said ultimately the girl’s fate rests on her father’s decision to seek entry into the U.S.

“This is just a very sad example of the dangers of this journey,” she said. “This family chose to cross illegally.”

The morning after the girl, Jackeline Call Maquin, and her father, Nery Caal, were taken into custody, Jackeline started vomiting. She was not breathing when she arrived at a Border Patrol station in New Mexico. Emergency medical technicians revived her twice and she was flown to a hospital in El Paso, Texas, where she was found to have swelling in her brain and liver failure, officials said. She died around noon the next day.